The Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans Association issued the following statement today:
IAVA CEO and Founder Paul Rieckhoff issued the following statement:
“The new IG report on the Phoenix VA is damning and outrageous. It also reveals the need for a criminal investigation. Each day we learn how awful things are in Phoenix and across the country. The VA’s problems are broad and deep – and President Obama and his team haven’t demonstrated they can fix it. As one of only two combat veterans, Senator John McCain’s call for Secretary Shinseki’s resignation is particularly impactful.
Rieckhoff added: “Today’s report makes it painfully clear that the VA does not always have our veterans’ backs. Even before this report came out, IAVA members were losing confidence in Secretary Shinseki and President Obama. At Memorial Day events across the nation, our members voiced outrage, anger, and impatience at the growing VA scandal. This new report only increases the belief that the promise to veterans has been broken. We are sharing this report now with our members and seeking their reaction. In the coming days, we will share the voices of our members with the President, VA leaders and those in Congress.”
The President of the American Legion has stated:
“The question is this: if the administration has known about these issues for at least four years, why is it just now taking action?
“Moreover, the president’s decision to keep Secretary Shinseki at his post is an unfortunate one. The VA has been aware for some time that inappropriate scheduling procedures are widespread among its medical facilities. Yet Secretary Shinseki has taken no initiative in correcting the problem. Veterans continue to die waiting for their health care, senior VA executives continue to get their bonuses, and only after all of this is the secretary now pledging to fix what’s wrong.
“So now America’s veterans are told, in effect, wait a while longer and things will get better. Meanwhile, care is delayed or denied and veterans and their families suffer. Words are nice, and even somewhat comforting, but when will the VA’s house be cleansed of those who are soiling it and dishonoring the system?”
I am a member of the Vietnam Veterans of America. I also work for a VA Medical Center. The VVA has not issued a statement, but I thoroughly agree with the IAVA and the Legion. But, let me give you another side of the story. Not everyone at a VA Medical Center is a high-level executive. Most of us are trying to provide care. I happen to be the Laboratory Manager. There are also nurses, physical therapists, respiratory therapists, X-ray technicians, surgical technicians, etc., etc. In both of the VA Medical Centers at which I have worked, the number of patients has been going up as well as the number of procedures. This has increased the workload and the stress levels on those actually doing the work. We could use some help.
Nevertheless, I do agree with the veteran organizations. The delay in hiring people, the delay in contracts, the difficult layers of approvals and signatures necessary for even the simplest of actions, adds time and complexity to an already difficult job. It saddens me because I care for my fellow veteran. I hope that this time the investigations will lead to some real action and to a somewhat radical restructuring of the Department of Veterans Affairs.
Miserable northeastern VA will not extend testing to children of Agent Orange victims, whereas in the south they do, according to a friend of mine who has the affliction. What gives? You would think a federal agency would do things across the board, but no.
No, sadly, the VA has variable interpretations that can differ between VA Medical Centers. Thus, Human Resources in one VA can allow something that is denied in another VA to employees. Contracts allows something in a contract in one VA that is denied in another VA.
The first culprit in this is Congress which has refused to pass the necessary funding to ensure that the VA health system is fully staffed and equipped.
Sadly, I wish they were the first culprit. I think that, in a lot of ways, we have shot ourselves.
For instance, let’s say I want to hire someone, even for an empty slot. I have to go to a committee to approve re-filling that empty slot. The committee meets once a month, and if you miss the submission deadline, I have to wait another month. If I accidentally miss one jot or one tittle of the application, then it is returned, and I have to wait another month.
When it is finally approved, if at all, I can finally go to HR with the approval. There, they check the requirements to make sure they are up to date, and, hopefully, publish it within a week or two. But, then, for most jobs, the job has to be posted for a minimum amount of time. Many times, it can be up to a month.
People who want the job have to submit their application online. If you make even one mistake or miss filling even one line, your application is never seen by me. After the deadline, HR reviews the applications, and passes on only those applications that fully meet every requirement. I cannot even see if the line that was missed on a rejected application was an important line or not. Did I mention that time is passing?
I finally get to review the applications, and now I, and several others, must form a committee to hold interviews with ALL the candidates. They have to be performance oriented interviews, which means that I must ask all sort of story questions to encourage them to answer fully to let me evaluate. I have to give points to each answer. The questions must be identical for each candidate or the process is thrown out. I should not follow up too much on any pre-approved question lest I invalidate the process.
Generally, the top candidate is offered the job. Oops, did I mention that time has been passing? We are now up to a couple of months after the applicant has put in their application, and at least four since I had the job opening. Guess what! If they needed a job, chances are that they have found a job and turn us down. Now, we go to the next candidate on the list, and so on.
OK, so, someone accepts a job offer. Well, it is a professional job, so they must submit all their transcripts and licenses in order to be validated. No, they did not have to submit them during the application process. And, we cannot tell them for sure what salary will be offered, except in a very general range.
You see, if they qualify for a professional job (medical technologist, nurse, etc.) they next go to a board, which is independent from me and my VA, to determine what their salary will be based on their experience and training. Once that board makes a decision, a salary is settled, and the applicant is given a final job offer. They may not arrive for another month at our facility.
Realistically, even in the best of circumstances, it often takes six months to fill a vacancy. To work at the VA, you have to want to work at the VA. If you are unemployed when you begin the application process, you better hope that you can live at someone’s house because it will be a while.
There are many times when Congress has allotted the money, but the process has killed the possibility of hiring someone.
Hmm, I guess it is better if I do not describe the process of trying to put out a contract (for bid) for a piece of equipment. It would only depress you.
I am pretty sure a major reason for the slowness of this process is a lack of funding. At the same time, I understand what you are saying. It seems that the VA has set up a hiring process that is designed to deal with inadequate funding, and it cannot adjust when money is, in fact, available.
That’s not just VA hiring policy — that’s pretty much across-the-board government hiring, with a few VA-specific quirks.
At my DoD agency, if you want an internal transfer, you can apply for one. HR (or whatever they’re calling it these days; I lose track) then weeds out applications, then the division with the opening narrows it down to a few (four, maybe) who get interviewed. After the interview, they offer the position to their first choice, but if the first choice says no, they aren’t allowed to offer it to the second choice; they have to start the entire process all over again.